"It was wonderful what you said about America," she said, looking at him with appealing seriousness.
"Why?" he asked.
"It was a breath of the real America," she answered. "I've fallen into the provincial French view. America is to-morrow! I like that. You've made me feel the call of America; aroused the dormant American corpuscles in my blood," she continued, gazing thoughtfully at the path and then up at him. "I want to go to America. I'd like to see those Rocky Mountains and I'd like to pay a return visit from Mervaux to Longfield."
"You would? But you'd find it quiet—little to do."
"Is there much to do at Mervaux? Shouldn't I have my painting? My American corpuscles would make me feel at home."
She had carried him a stage farther on his course, dispelling the doubts which had occurred to him as a warning to pause.
"I—I——" he began. His throat seemed out of order; he was stuttering. Madame Ribot's call from the doorway of the house came as a mixture of relief and unwelcome interruption.
"Somebody will be late for dinner if they do not hurry," said Madame Ribot. "And the news is not good. Even Count de la Grange, who has just been here, admits that it is not. However, he doesn't think that anything will happen to disturb us here."